Republicans banking on 2012

While hundreds of millions of dollars are spent in battles over President Barack Obama’s ambitious legislative agenda in Washington, underneath the radar, some of the Republican Party’s next best hopes are laying the groundwork for the bid to replace him — or at least secure their place in the GOP hierarchy.

Consider this: In the first half of 2009, Mitt Romney’s political committee paid $188,000 to a small army of consultants, Newt Gingrich’s dropped $628,000 on charter flights, Mike Huckabee’s wrote staff paychecks totaling $131,000 and Sarah Palin’s spent $107,000 raising more money.

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All four are considered potential presidential candidates, and the flurry of campaign finance activity, outlined in reports filed late last month with the Federal Election Commission and Internal Revenue Service, may hold clues about their prospects — and intentions.

Each insist they’re using their efforts to help rebuild the party — and the conservative movement — after the GOP’s debilitating losses in the past two election cycles, not jockeying for 2012 pole position.

But the manner in which such money is being spent suggests they are as much focused on accumulating the resources for a national infrastructure and keeping high their national profiles as party-building activities.

“If you’re a Republican thinking about running against Obama, you just can’t wake up in January 2011 and say, ‘I think I want to run for president.’ If you wait until then, it’s too late,” said Michael Toner, a former FEC chairman who was general counsel for George W. Bush’s presidential campaign in 2000 and Fred Thompson’s in 2008. “You’re going to have to be able to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, so you have to spend 2009 and 2010 building out your fundraising base, your infrastructure and your network.”

The political groups run by Romney, Gingrich, Huckabee and Palin, combined with those run by Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia and Sens. John Thune of South Dakota and Jim DeMint of South Carolina (also thought of as at least possible 2012 GOP prospects), brought in a total of $12.9 million in the first half of the year, a POLITICO analysis of IRS and FEC reports found.

These entities, which are not campaign committees and are legally barred from directly supporting their own potential campaigns, spent a total of $12.4 million, including $6.2 million on fundraising, $1.2 million on 39 staffers’ salaries and benefits, $851,000 on direct mail, $686,000 on consultants, $192,000 on websites, $123,000 on catering and $111,000 on lawyers. The groups ended June with $2 million in the bank.